I built a cider press

[IainM]

Last year I made perry and juiced the pears with a masticating juicer. It was a pain in the ass, but I've been put off getting a fruit press due to the price. Well, I'm visiting my parents at the moment and the old man has a shed full of tools and spare bits of wood, and we have family about to dote over the baby and 3yo, so I thought I'd take advantage of the free time to make a cider press. I had to buy the bolts for £8.50. The cloth was cut from a £6 bed sheet from Wilko. The plastic tray was £1.50 and the chopping board was £2. The scissor jack was borrowed from the car, so all in it cost £18 to make.

Not bad for a mornings work. The afternoon was spend doing a small test batch of cider. I first tried stacking the wraps, but it was slipping. I need to get some more chopping boards and put holes in them, and also put less in each sheet, plus be a bit more careful lining it up, then I should be able to do a gallon of juice at a time instead of piecemeal.

Apples were from the in-laws place, just the ones I found on the ground. They have a bumper crop this year.

Pounding them by hand was annoying. I need to make a scratter as the next project, or use my paint mixer or other improvised equivalent to the pulpmaster.

All my demijonhs, hydrometer, campden tablets and so on are at home, so I just got a large bottle of water from the co-op and a pack of wine yeast from Wilko. No idea what the OG is. I got 4.5L into the bottle, plus a litre or so of apple juice to share with the family.

 

[freester]

Nice work that man. When I started researching my cider project last year I came to the conclusion that presses were relatively cheap to make or buy, the difficult bit was the scratter.

I saw online somewhere a guy who made a scratter from a round bit of wood with stainless steel screws with the heads protruding from the roller, with a handle to manually rotate. I'll see if I can find the link.

This year I have repurposed a garden shredder. I've run a small amount of apples through and the pulp is good for juicing.

Edit added link
And here is the link
http://www.jamesandtracy.co.uk/howto/making_fruit_scratter.htm

 

[Tonibee]

I made a press this year to and I was able to stack my wraps 7 or 8 high. I made a frame to fit the same tray as you and with sufficient space for juice to drain. The inside dimensions are 30x20cm. I cut my cloths 3x that size. Put your frame on the tray with the cloth laid inside it and put in about 2cm deep of pulp, spreading it out evenly and into the corners. Fold in both sides and the tops and bottoms, which keeps the wrap secure. Lift the tray straight up - and you will find it will sit loosely on top of the wrap allowing you to repeat the process. I was able to get 4.5 to five litres per press. I found that by folding the pressed wraps in half and pressing again, I could get about another litre, but the wraps had a tendency to slip and I only did that twice. I pressed 60 litres (but I mashed by hand, which was hard work and it took 3 days to get my 60 litres working for 5-6 hours a day).

The first pic top left shows loading the pulp into the press and you can see that the frame sits just nicely on the wraps below. The pic lower rights shows 5 litres in the bucket and flattened wraps. I bought a 3-tonne bottle jack because I didn't know what my car jack was rated for and I didn't want to take a chance.

 

[freester]

I made a press this year to and I was able to stack my wraps 7 or 8 high.

For information that 'stack of wraps' is traditionally known as a 'cheese'.

 

[IainM]

I made a press this year to and I was able to stack my wraps 7 or 8 high. I made a frame to fit the same tray as you and with sufficient space for juice to drain. The inside dimensions are 30x20cm. I cut my cloths 3x that size. Put your frame on the tray with the cloth laid inside it and put in about 2cm deep of pulp, spreading it out evenly and into the corners. Fold in both sides and the tops and bottoms, which keeps the wrap secure. Lift the tray straight up - and you will find it will sit loosely on top of the wrap allowing you to repeat the process. I was able to get 4.5 to five litres per press. I found that by folding the pressed wraps in half and pressing again, I could get about another litre, but the wraps had a tendency to slip and I only did that twice. I pressed 60 litres (but I mashed by hand, which was hard work and it took 3 days to get my 60 litres working for 5-6 hours a day).

The first pic top left shows loading the pulp into the press and you can see that the frame sits just nicely on the wraps below. The pic lower rights shows 5 litres in the bucket and flattened wraps. I bought a 3-tonne bottle jack because I didn't know what my car jack was rated for and I didn't want to take a chance.

Nice work. Sixty litres is impressive! I bet crushing all those apples by hand was a good work out. Mine was very last minute, a bit rushed, and not particularly well thought through. It doesn't have much of a shelf, so I have to balance it precariously. I took it for another whirl today and got 11L from a 2:1 mix of pears and apples, lots of different random apples. I bought a cheap 2 tonne scissor jack from ebay for a tenner, which is better because it has a flat pressing surface on both sides and not a ridged one to slot under the car and, as you say, I don't know the rating of the car jack. I also got some nylon straining fabric, so this time I just laid it out, put some on by hand and spread it out, then fold the cloth and do the next layer, until its finished and I just wrap it up with the remaining cloth. This seemed to work well buy I would like to get round to making a tin for moulding the cheeses. I also got a pulpmaster online for £18, but it doesn't work very well.

 

[Tonibee]

Thanks! Yes, it was a little bit of a work out. By the third, and last, day though, I'd settled into a nice routine. I also found that by remashing and squeezing the pulp, I could get another 1.5 litres - but I only did that twice (once just to try it, and once to squeeze my last batch to 18 litres).

My cheeses were a mix of muslin and two grades of calico. I wouldn't use muslin again, but the calico worked well. Picked up enough off cuts from a fabric shop for £4, and threw them out when done. I think thick cotton bed sheets (the type that hospitals use) would also be good.

I do intend to have another cider week next year, so the goal is to build a simple masher/grinder for then. I don't like the suggestions I've so far seen online, so thinking about alternatives...

Have you seen my thread here: http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=73125

If you have anything to add, would appreciate it.